I was born in a hospital just outside Jasper. Dubois County, technically, since my parents were living in Jasper at the time. Either way, this is home, and it's where I grew up.

I left in December 2010. I'd met Maggie in 2008, and when the time came to choose, I moved up to Chicago to be with her. I never really let go of this place. I was back all the time.

We came home in September 2023. Not for a job, and definitely not for a campaign. We came back to put down roots.

Over a decade is a long time to be away, and the place had changed. Some of that is just how time works. But the change that stuck with me was in the representation. Somewhere in those years, too many of the people we elect seem to have forgotten that they work for the people who live here, not for the party leaders who put them on the ballot.

In late December 2024, Maggie and I bought what we thought would be our forever home. In January 2025, we found out it sits in the study area for a billion-dollar highway.

The realtor knew. The brokerage knew. The city knew. The county knew. The state knew. Nobody told us.

I want to be honest about that. It changed me. Not because of what could happen to our house, but because of what it taught me about how decisions get made around here.

So I started paying attention. I went to meetings. I talked to neighbors, to farmers, to small business owners, to people whose families have worked the same land for four and five generations. And I kept hearing the same thing in different words: nobody asked us. By the time we found out, it was a done deal. I called my representative and they never called back. I showed up to speak and they'd already taken the vote.

Republicans said it. Democrats said it. People who hadn't voted in twenty years said it. When Republicans and Democrats agree you're not listening, you're not listening.

And what I found is what actually got me involved. This wasn't a case of a good project explained badly. The highway was deeply unpopular with the people who would pay for it and live beside it. Nobody could tell me what we would actually get for the money. What it did have was a clear set of people on the inside who stood to do well out of it. And the officials we elected were determined to ram it through anyway.

Then I did what I do for a living. I pulled the data. We commissioned a real poll of 636 registered voters across Dubois County, conducted by Public Policy Polling. The result: 81% opposed the project. Not a slim margin. Not ambiguous. Eighty-one percent.

Some people said that was just a local issue, just the folks in the path. So we tested it. A statewide poll of 554 Indiana voters found that 74% want the Mid-States Corridor canceled, and 88% want the money redirected to local road and bridge projects.

I organized ten town halls across the district. I spoke at council meetings. I presented the numbers and asked for a vote. On February 23, 2026, I stood in front of the Dubois County Council and asked them to withdraw the county from the corridor Regional Development Authority.

Somewhere along the way I realized this was never really about one highway. It's a pattern. Decisions made without the people who live here. Representatives who stopped representing. A government that forgot who it works for.

That's why I'm running for Indiana State Senate, District 48. Not because I ever wanted to be a politician — I didn't. Because the people of this district deserve someone who will do the homework, ask the people, and fight for their answer.

If you call, I'll call back. If there's a meeting, I'll be at it. Before any vote that matters, I'll find the people it affects most and ask them what I'm missing. If I get something wrong, I'll own it. That's not a campaign promise. That's just how I was raised, and it's how I'd do this job.

I intend to prove it.